The Things I Cannot Change
by basicallyblind
Summary: Brittany Susan Pierce was gone. Life as I knew it- gone. And amidst the maddening period of accepting this dreary, new reality, I had become an addict and an alcoholic and was desperate for help.
1. Chapter 1

A/N: Glee characters belong to R.M., not me.

This story is almost completely AU and takes place approximately 7 years after graduation from McKinley. Santana's POV. Most of the major Glee characters will make an appearance at some point.

The main focus of this chapter is to introduce Santana's thoughts and feelings so there is very little dialogue. However, in the chapters to follow, there will be more of an emphasis on the actions taking place, rather than the thoughts being processed.

**CHAPTER 1**

The inevitable loss had arrived. Terrifying things are always punctual. I had a typical reaction to this rather overwhelming situation. To any unknowing spectator, it would have surely appeared rather boring.

My thoughts generated in slow motion. Time had a stutter. It went back and forth and shifted through tenses. Like the gradual assent of a roller-coaster car, right before it reaches its destined height, you hear that hollow crack signaling the inevitable release. The downward force is so powerful, your organs surge straight up your body until they reach your throat and gag you.

After the toxic mindfuck that was my brief dalliance with Quinn Fabray, (feelings-be- damned style) along came Brittany. Happiness I swore I was incapable of feeling, or even deserving of, began to burst from within me. The HBIC facade was diminishing a little more everyday. She made my world brighter and I wanted to be a nicer person because I genuinely felt like one. And then it happened. We broke up, rather, she broke up with me and karmic balance was again restored.

My world had just been hijacked by the person I loved most. Betrayal is the deadliest incentive. My immediate, fresh-wound emotions were so predictably human. Eruptions of sadness, anger and powerlessness, each summoning the next, soon blended into an unstoppable force, usurping any and every practical thought.

I smoked weed like a fiend. Morning- wake and bake, Noon- pack a bowl, thoughts of Brittany- roll a blunt, rinse and repeat. This cycle continued until there wasn't a second of the day when my brain wasn't doused with a generous coating of THC. Being high didn't actually feel like being high anymore. And who says you can't develop a tolerance for weed?

I brought in the next best thing, booze. It started with gin and tonics but that nagging voice of Sue Sylvester kept breaking through my haze, telling me to drop the tonic.

"Sandbags, if you're gonna act like the chunks of albino stripper vomit I pull from my hair every Tuesday, the least you could do is give up those calories." So straight gin it was.

Until this moment, I had yet to encounter this new kind of stranger, posing as my own reflection; some shell of a creature with soulless, vacant eyes, wearing a Santana mask. We would toast each other many times each night, the creature and its reflection. I poured shot after shot of straight gin into a small glass. I held each out at arms-length, towards the mirror and said, "to us" before I brought the glass to my lips and knocked it back like a pro. It was better than drinking alone.

There were nights when the creature caught a glimpse of Santana somewhere in the mirror. It would cry out, overcome with the sudden intrusion of emotions. It would ruthlessly rub at its bloodshot eyes until Santana was gone and everything was right again.

The entirety of my world consisted of a single girl, with whom I cultivated a tragic entanglement of love and madness for a period of four years. Lacking insight, we were innocent in our pursuit of a peaceful coexistence. In our final moment as a consenting duo, a unilateral decision was made and a bond was severed. Feelings for someone else? Just like that- is that even allowed? When things appear too good to be true, it's because they are.

The first time I saw her with Sam they were holding hands and giggling as if the world hadn't stopped spinning. Even I couldn't have predicted my next move. Everyday for one month, I held out a metaphorical gun, cocked, with the tip of the barrel kissing her temple. Her raw vulnerability in these moments threatened to draw me back to the beginning; to our initial encounters when the sun would break through and spill all over my "bitch cloud."

When she was sad, I transformed into some mother fucking Rachel Berry impersonator (taller, prettier, more talented, sexier...the list goes on), singing any song that would pull her from her doldrums and make her smile.

Ripped from the trenches of my brief respite, reality strikes and the pain is back in my chest, announcing its return in short, staccato bursts. What the fuck marijuana, I thought we were friends?

When I finally got her alone (after I stalked her and Trouty Mouth all around town) I was actually rough with her. It felt strange denying every instinct I had to only treat her with the utmost respect and gentleness she deserved. As she waved goodbye to Sam with that familiar, happy glint in her eyes, I got out of my candy apple red Audi and grabbed her before she could even register my presence. I pulled her towards my car, pushed her in the passenger side and quickly took a seat on the driver's side.

"Santana, what's going on?" She demanded.

But I could see the fear all over her face. She was trembling. I looked straight through those baby blues and said, "if you keep seeing that Avatar reject, I'm going to make him disappear."

She withdrew further from me in the seat she was forced into, met my eyes briefly and said,"You smell like Lord Tubbington after he comes home from that biker bar."

Tears filled her eyes, threatening a chain reaction. I struggled to maintain the hard expression on my face as I pressed the unlock button as fast as the stoner neurons in my brain would allow.

It was easy enough to elicit the desired response from the most vulnerable of victims. Though, her daily compliance failed to provide me with even a semblance of satisfaction. Instead, I felt repulsion in the wake of my actions, and the longer I continued on this malevolent path, the more I felt the gun twisting in my sweaty palm, toward my own direction.

It was a Thursday afternoon when I initiated my next sneak attack. Only this time there were no desperate or empty threats. I simply told her, "forget it, I'm done," releasing that burden with a deafening thud. This concluded our final correspondence.

Even with the last tie severed, I still felt drawn to her, as if by some imagined tether connecting me to all that was left- longing. I stood impatiently stagnant, stymied to this wretched moment in time. My thoughts were swirling with the darkest blues that had ever brushed my canvas. Only Kurt should have these kind of gay-ass thoughts. Thank god they're only in my head.

For a moment, I allowed my mind to suffer in sobriety as I reflected on the irreversible damage I had caused. Through my actions, I annihilated any chance of a reconciliation, any hope of a future-anything.

It was time to mourn the deceased. Even with all of my toxic survivor tools, I could no longer play the part of some guiltless villain. I now accepted every feeling of relentless rage and absolute emptiness as my own to fester in. It finally felt like I was home.

Brittany Susan Pierce was gone. Life as I knew it- gone. And amidst the maddening period of accepting this dreary, new reality, I had become an addict and an alcoholic and was desperate for help.


	2. Chapter 2

CHAPTER 2

A/N: Glee characters belong to R.M., not me.

This story is completely AU and takes place approximately 7 years after graduation from McKinley. Most of the major Glee characters will make an appearance at some point.

So, for those of you who are reading/following/favoriting this THANK YOU! Any suggestions or criticisms are totally welcomed and appreciated. With that being said, I present the next chapter.

(NOTE: This chapter is a bit on the short-side. Just know it is setting the scene up for chapter 3.)

Now, I know what you're thinking. Rehab is like a rite of passage for celebrities such as myself. But I'm the daughter of Dr. and Mrs. Perfect Lopez and as much as I hate to acknowledge my upper-middle-class advantage in life, this shit shouldn't be happening to me. At least not in accordance with my ignorantly sterile perception of the world.

I don't usually think of myself as being all that introspective and whatnot but I did know that I was in a state of crisis. I felt sick everyday. Hangovers plus withdrawal, plus heartbreak, divided by a heaping pile of self-esteem issues, equals bad fucking news. There was this looming sense of rock bottom that felt closer than I cared to admit.

Forcing any energy reserves I still had to the surface, I half-assed my way into research mode and found a rehab facility that almost kept the bile where it belonged in my stomach. Serenity Treatment Center, nestled in the hills of sunny Malibu, C.A. made the cut.

It's not as though I thought, in any way, that I was deserving of a luxury rehabilitation, but relying on the foggy memories of some psych class from my undergraduate years, I knew that being comfortable was a pretty crucial aspect of the recovery process. I knew I was making an informed, albeit, self-serving decision. All there was left to do was inform the parents and book my flight.

Shortly after touching down at L.A.X., I was greeted by an average-sized black dude named Donny, holding a sign with my name on it. After packing my bags into a black Escalade, he shut the trunk and we were on our way. Donny was a bit of a chatty motherfucker and even though I was jet-lagged and feeling rather nauseated, I was nervous as hell and thankful for a distraction of any kind. He disclosed to me, within the first few sentences of his introduction, that he was in recovery (a weird fact that would be shoved down my throat by almost every person I'd come across for the next month or so). He also shared that 95% of the staff at Serenity were in recovery as well. This was a huge relief for me. Good, I thought. At least these fuckers will know where I'm coming from.

Even though I'd perused the Serenity site quite a bit in anticipation of my trip to Cali, I was not at all prepared for the astonishing beauty that I'd be taking in upon arrival. From the elaborate landscaping, to the classically elegant architecture of the buildings, to the gentle Malibu climate, I was surrounded by absolute paradise. The sickness that assaulted my body and the nerves that wracked my brain could not have detracted from the fucking 9th World Wonder that was the Serenity Ranch.

For the first time, in a long time, I was cognizant of my surroundings. I drew in a cleansing breath through my lungs and let it out slowly, with purpose. It left me feeling a little lighter, like my albatross went on Atkins or something. Donny led the way into what he called the main house and I was greeted by the woman that I'd be spending the next few hours of my time with.

Margie guided me through an agonizing process of filling out what seemed like hundreds and hundreds of pages of paper work. Rules and guidelines and contracts for my time spent there. I was signing my life away during the truest form of vulnerability that I had yet to experience, aside from my infancy. And I did so, hoping that my intuitions were not solely those of a drugged out mind and would not completely fail me.

I was beginning to accept that for the next month, my time would obviously be spent filling out forms. Sobriety through paperwork, it was kind of brilliant. That's when Margie glanced up from the paper work began speaking.

"You know Santana, you're not the only resident from Lima, Ohio that we have with us currently. What the fuck is she talking about? Lima, as in population, me and a cow, as in NO ONE is from Lima and is here, right now, at Serenity? Not being the most perceptive woman on the planet, she continued her session of shock and awe with a confident smile on her face, as if she was revealing the greatest news of anyone's life. But unlike an intravenous drug user from the 1980s who just scored a negative HIV test, this was unfucking-believably terrible info.

"Yeah, and she's about your age too, I think." Before she could name my fellow hometown inhabitant, I saw a familiar flick of blonde hair approaching the glass door to the main house I was currently sitting in. Fuck my life. This was NOT happening. Wake up Santana, you're drunk, stoned and having a very lifelike hallucination. But the moment our eyes met, I could see a flash of shock slip into fear like a seamless emotional summersault. I matched her expression, tenfold. Quinn Motherfucking Fabray.


	3. Chapter 3

A/N: Glee characters belong to R.M., not me.

This story is completely AU and takes place approximately 7 years after graduation from McKinley. Most of the major Glee characters will make an appearance at some point. Santana's POV.

So, for those of you who are reading/following/favoriting/reviewing this THANK YOU! Any suggestions or criticisms are totally welcomed and appreciated.

NOTE: Dream sequence will be in italics

**Chapter 3:**

Quinn attempts to carry on smalltalk in a way that a person might, given the proper psychosis, with an inanimate object. Not really with the expectation of a response of any kind.

"Hey San, beautiful weather we're having." She husks with that seductive gravelly quality to her voice.

I ungracefully continue my descent down the steps leading away from the "Princess Suite," the room designated for newcomers at the Serenity Ranch and arguably, the best room on site. After wiping the sleep from my eyes, and making sure to greet Quinn with my best "don't fuck with me" glare, I grab a cup from the counter near the coffee pot and begin helping myself. The slight tremor in my hand makes this task infinitely more difficult than it should be.

The kitchen, being one of the several common areas of the house that I make careful efforts to frequent, as infrequently as possible, happens to be the first room I reach, upon exiting my room.

"Sup new blood?" A young guy with a Mohawk sits across from me at the table, shooting a wink towards my direction after eying me up and down.

Quinn takes the seat next to him, coffee already in hand, smoothing down her yellow sundress as she scoots towards the table. Her hair is long and blonde and in subtle waves framing her face perfectly as she smiles at me.

Turning my attention over to Winky, I give a cheap smirk with a tight jaw and manage, "hey there, Mohawk."

"Name's Puck. Quinn tells me you guys used to go school together in Bumfuck, Ohio. Small world dude, small world" he says, shaking his head in amusement at the coincidence.

"Yeah, Q and I go way back, don't we Barbie?" I ask giving her a subtle nod.

"So what's your poison there chica?" He asks, thinking he's cute.

"Oh you know, I'm a simple girl. Just the occasional absinthe enemas for me. But the real reason I'm here is for my bleach and battery acid diet. People can be such haters." I deadpan.

Quinn starts to laugh but instead chokes on the mouthful off coffee she was attempting to swallow.

He gives me this dumfounded look, as if he actually just bought my ludicrous story.

"She's kidding." Quinn manages, after her coughing subsides.

"Damn girly, just being my curious self. S'okay though, I'll just chalk that up on account of the DTs. You'll be warming up to the Puckasaurus in no time-hey Finneous, grab me a waffle!" He shouts to a tall, dopey looking guy across the kitchen.

"Catch ya later druggies." He tosses a wink and a smile at Quinn and I before exiting the table.

I wipe my hand down the length of my face, not really too sold on the fact at this is actually what's happening right now in my life. I open my mouth to say something, I'm sure genius, about the little encounter with Mohawk when I feel a hand tap my shoulder lightly.

"Santana Lopez?" A petite blonde woman with excessive facial work but not altogether unpleasant looking, asks.

"That'd be me." I tell her, looking up from the table. I'm partly grateful for her interruption from potential walks down memory lane with Mary Fucking Sunshine over here, but a little apprehensive about the prospect of what she might like from me.

I'd already done the strip search with Nancy Grace's stunt double (you know she has one), one of the techs here at Serenity. I know I'm downplaying it cause I'm a general badass, but that shit's really degrading and not something I ever pictured myself having to do, at least in this lifetime. Then, I attempted to complete what they referred to as my first U.A., aka urine analysis, aka public viewing of my pee pee time. But I froze up on account of the fact that my bladder forgot it's from Lima Heights. So, I could only look forward to whatever came next.

"It's nice to meet you, I'm April Rhodes, the on-call nurse." She tells me with a gentle smile. She's actually kind of beautiful for an old lady and if you look between the collagen here and there, she could pass for Q's mom. She tells me to follow her to the nurses station so they can get all my meds straightened out. As I lag behind her slightly, I wonder to myself if she knew that her true calling in life was to do voice overs for cartoons.

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

The next time Quinn asks me about the weather, it's a little later in the afternoon. Same day. I'm beginning to think it must be a line straight out of the Serenity script or something but if she's asks again, imma slap a ho! There's the old Santana, I thought, almost.

It's 73 degrees and sunny in Malibu today and despite knowing this to be fact, (I managed to swipe my iPhone as they were locking up everything else that connects me to the outside world) I was going to keep it to myself. Santana 1, Quinn 0.

I decided not to encourage her stupid efforts of trying to fill the uncomfortable silence between us. But what she doesn't know is that now, I'm taking a mental note to write a manifesto of sorts entitled, "The Silence Between Us: The Santana and Quinn Story" in hopes she reads it and takes its message to heart. Shit's gonna be uncomfortable.

I subconsciously back my way into the living area, never turning around, finally (un)settling myself on the sectional in the center of the room. She cautiously follows me inside and with great apprehension, takes a seat next to me. I roll small balls of lint between my fingers from the afghan beside me, diverting my attention anywhere but in the direction of (Pretty) Girl, Interrupted over on my right.

I knew she wanted to say something but she continued towards something else, and I'm not sure I wanted to hear any of it. But as much as it pained me to admit, even her company was a welcomed distraction from thoughts of having to meet my individual counselor later that afternoon. Kristin or Kacey or whatever the fuck her name was. So I lazily added to my collection of lint balls, as though they were my main focus.

I maintained a certain presence with Quinn through my periphery and could feel her steady gaze come to rest on my face. I briefly acknowledged to myself, that my physical appearance had taken somewhat of a beating, so-to-speak, during those tumultuous two years (if i'm being honest, three and a half) of self-destruction and wondered how different I must have appeared to her. I had put on some weight and just generally disregarded my physical appearance altogether. I mean, I still wasn't by any means, ugly, this is still me we're talking about. But no effort. Because effort took effort and I was tapped out. Wait, was I starting to care about something? Nah.

"This is new." She states, casually stretching her arm out towards my elbow that was facing her.

She drifted her cold fingers lightly across my skin, outlining the two and a half inch scar that finished at the top of my forearm. After a moment too long, it seemed, my brain had recognized that I was supposed to feel something, triggering a reaction of fear. I jerked away as if I'd been burned, and shifted further from her into the couch. It struck me just then how long it'd been since I experienced any physical contact of any kind. I heard a sigh escape her soft lips, not necessarily one of pity or frustration, but perhaps an indication that she realized her error.

Without another word passing from either of us, I left the living space and returned to my bedroom, exhausted as ever. Finding the room to myself, I peeled back the covers on my pristinely made bed (courtesy of the wonderful staff at this fine establishment) and sunk into my pillow. I closed my eyes and shut my mind off from this realm, only to enter another.

_A beautifully poised, more stereotypical version Quinn appeared before me. She had emerged hot as ever, in her cheerios uniform and high ponytail to match, from some back ally memory that was never meant to be uncovered. While revisiting with this fantasy-Quinn, this blast from my past, we flipped through an album together. I was pleasantly inundated with images of pink hair, pyramid bodies, red pleated skirts and a whole lotta sundresses. She was looking at me with those pretty greens while playfully nudging my stomach with her elbow, just laughing so freely. _

_Suddenly those eyes were looking more blue than green and she grew a few inches taller, looking less and less Quinn-like. The smile on my face drooped into that default frown shape we're all more familiar with, and the sweet sounds of laughter turned into a cacophony of sobs. _

"_Why would you do this Santana!?" She asked loudly between cries, rubbing roughly at those pretty blues. And then softer, "You always protected me, San, always, even when we were little." _

_I watched my own broken self look at her, guilt-stricken, heart- broken, my breath heaving in my chest, swallowing copious amounts of air while the muscles in my chest kept tightening and flexing. _

"_I know Britts, I'm so sorry," I offer weakly, knowing it would never be enough. _

_I turned my back to to her, desperately seeking composure. I drew a thick blunt that I didn't know I'd been holding, toward my lips. It was dark all around us and difficult to make out our surroundings. But as soon as I sparked the lighter with my free hand and the flame flashed, I saw the enormous willow tree and the space underneath it that we both knew so well. I mechanically brought the light to the tip of the brown paper and took a deep drag. The slow burn settling in my lungs was a comfort. In my new life, it was my go-to substitute in place of a warm, indescribably soft hug from my sweetest love. I told myself, it more or less had the same effect. _

_Feeling much lighter than before, I slowly turned back to face her. I held my arm outstretched in offering with the blunt and said, "here Britts this will make you feel bett..." _

_But it wasn't my teary-eyed dancer I was facing, it was a furious Sam who's shirt looked comically small, making it appear as though his muscles were trying to break free of it._

_Without a word, he took my throat in his fist and squeezed, slamming me up against the light blue siding of the Pierce residence. _

"_Please, please!" I tried to choke out. Although I'm not quite sure what I'm pleading for, finally getting exactly what I deserved. _

"_I'm sorry," I tried again, hoping to convey the truest sincerity I felt through my words. His other arm stretched out and I thought for sure I was dead. But instead of joining his other hand around my throat, he began smoothing his fingers gently over my hair, while the grip of his other hand was slowly loosening. _

"_It's okay Santana," he whispered as soothingly as a person could. _

I couldn't begin to understand what was happening as everything started to go dark. My heavy eyes cracked opened and I was met with the image of a petite redhead (a woman I would later learn to be my roommate, Emma). She was standing at my bedside, slowly stroking my hair and softly telling me that I was alright, that it was just a bad dream. If only she knew the truth.

I was still breathing quite heavily and my pulse was racing. My body was drenched in sweat from the intensity of the dream but also from the effects of withdrawal. I was still in the detox phase of rehabilitation. My body's way of ridding itself of the poison I forced into it, day after meaningless day. I hoped all the bad inside me would pour right out along with it.

The sheets were damp and sticking to me and my hair was matted and stuck to my head. My erratic breathing had slowed but was replaced with fresh tears rolling from the corners of my eyes, one indistinguishably after the next, in a steady stream onto my pillow. I felt Emma's fingers gently wiping the tears from my face, quietly humming the tune from a song I didn't know.

**Please leave a review, if you can. I'd really appreciate to know what makes sense, what doesn't things that you may want to have happen. **


End file.
